Scott Matson, Acting Deputy Director

Scott G. Matson is the acting Deputy Director for the Office of Sex Offender Sentencing, Monitoring, Apprehending, Registering, and Tracking (SMART) in the U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs. Mr. Matson oversees the office's work in assisting all states, principal U.S. territories, eligible Indian tribes and the District of Columbia on adopting the standards of the Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act (SORNA). In addition, he leads the Sex Offender Management Assessment and Planning Initiative, including planning the content for SMART's National Symposia on Sex Offender Management and Accountability. Mr. Matson also provides training and technical assistance on sex offender registration, notification and other sex offender management issues to the SORNA jurisdictions and to national, state and local government entities and advocacy organizations.

Prior to joining the SMART Office in 2009, Mr. Matson served in a variety of roles focused on improving criminal justice policies and practices. As a program manager at the JEHT Foundation, he developed and managed a criminal justice portfolio of more than 60 grantees on issues such as sentencing and corrections policy, reentry, wrongful convictions and the death penalty. Mr. Matson was the associate director of the Vera Institute of Justice's Center on Sentencing and Corrections, providing state policymakers assistance to improve criminal justice practices while reducing costs. Mr. Matson served as a research associate at the Center for Effective Public Policy's Center for Sex Offender Management where he provided training and technical assistance to a wide range of international, national, state and local audiences on sex offender management issues. Mr. Matson began his career at the Washington State Institute for Public Policy, where he evaluated a series of criminal and juvenile justice policies and programs and presented the findings to the Washington State Legislature.

Mr. Matson advised the U.S. General Counsel's Office in preparing its 2003 case before the U.S. Supreme Court on the constitutionality of Megan's Law in Alaska and Connecticut. In 2006, at the invitation of the Japan National Police Academy, he advised the Tokyo and Nara prefecture police on Megan's Law and other practices used to combat sexual violence in the United States. He is a subject matter expert on sex offender management issues and has appeared in The New York Times, USA Today, NPR and numerous local media outlets. Mr. Matson earned an M.A. in criminology and criminal justice from the University of Maryland, College Park and a B.A. in sociology from Western Washington University.